A big storm after Ukrainian-born swimmer Victoria Gonesh posted a photo on her Instagram account, stepping on the Russian flag, which is known to have invaded her home country in the past month.
The 23-year-old Gonash, who started her career under the name Victoria Solancheva, is currently competing for Turkey and won a 400-meter freestyle gold at the European Championships last year.
Needless to say, following a photo, she received angry reactions from Russian swimmers.
In response to the post, Russian swimmers Vladislav Greenb and Tatiana Blongoff posted the same message in their story, in which they called for action against Gonesh.
"Where are the limits to the permissible behavior of athletes?", They wrote.
"If you have decided that it is human to exclude Russian athletes from participating in international competitions, then you will act here as well. There is an unacceptable nationalism here in no way."
Ukraine's Avrupa Yüzme Şampiyonu milli yüzücümüz Viktoria Zeynep Güneş Instagram'da Rusya bayrağını ayağının altına alıp bir story paylaşmış.
- Selçuk (@ bayrone18) March 25, 2022
Clement Kolesnikov, who competed alongside Gonesh in the International Swimming League, also responded with an emoji of a man shrugging between two question marks.
The World Swimming Federation (FINA) has issued a statement encouraging competitors to act with dignity.
"FINA is aware of a post on social media attributed to Victoria Gonash, an athlete who was born in Ukraine and has previously competed for Ukraine. FINA encourages all athletes to behave with respect."
As a reminder, the governing body of the maritime sport agreed on March 23 to ban Russian and Belarusian athletes from competing in each of its events after several countries threatened to boycott this year's World Championships in Budapest if athletes from those countries compete in the Hungarian capital.
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